Red and Brown
by Reidicus
Summary: On the Eve of the Great War, a group of dwellers bound for their assigned Vault are sealed out of their only sanctuary. Clustered around the vault door, they face certain death by nuclear fire. (Any reviews are welcome. Feedback is AWESOME. The story is intentionally cryptic, good for a few readthroughs. PM me with any questions.)
1. Chapter 1

Red and brown

The wind was biting. The sweltering heat of the desert slowly transitioning into its cooler, more rational side. The side more atoned to eating a mans outer extremities bit by bit than nurturing life.

Red and brown

A radio clattered away somewhere nearby. A man, sounding, despite the circumstances, cheerful. Perhaps nestled away in a secure bunker of his own. Ignoring the hopeful citizens clustered outside.

Red and brown

They claimed that it would be random chance. That the country's surviving population would be selected randomly. That they, despite the meddling of their governments, would be safe.

Red and brown

And yet for all their speeches, all of their assurances, when it came down to the crisis, the doors closed. The reinforced behemoths designed to protect good American countrymen sealed while the people they were assigned to protect were still en route.

Red and brown

They cried at first. They begged, bargained, threatened. The number on the door was rendered unreadable by the fingernails scrabbling over its surface, over, and over, in some sort of monotonous, hopeless act of self preservation.

Red and brown

But when they looked up at the darkening sky, they only saw the bleak and unforgiving light of the stars. Stars that would not smile down upon them. Stars that would abandon them.

Red and brown

Even as they sat there, clustered in the sheltering arm of the hills, they knew it was coming. They knew the doors were sealed, that they had been cheated out of their gardens of plenty

Red and brown

They sat clustered there. Husbands and wives, fathers and sons, brothers and sisters, and knew they had no choice.

 _WELCOME_

They embraced the enveloping arms of death, brightened by their visions of hellfire, warmed by atomic fission.

And strode into oblivion.


	2. Emergence

Authors Note: Hey guys. I'd like to thank everyone that followed me, wasn't expecting that to happen. Please feel free to submit reviews, I need em'. Now enjoy the successor to Red and Brown.

A quiet scratch breaks the silence, awaking memories of a time long past. A red and brown monolith, shrouded in dust, bearing a number, rendered illegible by time; slowly begins to move from its berth.

Ancient machines, derived from a better world, grind with the effort of moving such a titan. Metal screeches in protest as the monolith begins to move. With one last screech of effort, it shudders to a halt, before silently moving aside.

For a moment, the wasteland is still, seemingly watching in awe as figures emerge from the dark aperture. They seem to blaze amidst the drab gray dirt, children of fire, imprisoned underground, returning to sunlight once more.

With muted steps, they spread out, exploring a world they once knew. They have been sleeping so, so long, dead men and women running from the reaper.

With slow, heavy movements, they uncover the fallen. For a century, they have lay there, undisturbed. Skeletons of all sizes draped around, trying to find solace in a slowly decaying world. Their mouths spread in grotesque smiles, laughing in the face of Armageddon, embracing their rapidly approaching demise.

Emergence

When they had left, the world was young and strong. They had lain down to sleep in their bunkers, knowing when they emerged the world would be young again.

But this…

No one expected this.

The silent reaper was still before them

Watching them all with hungry eyes

He had waited millennia for the world to end

He would wait many more for those that escaped him

They trekked back towards the sand blasted aperture

And watched in silence as the door was sealed

They had waited a century in silence. They would wait another for their salvation

They had the strength

They had the resolve

They had the technology

They had the tools to escape the reaper.


End file.
